Episode Details

Nine years ago, a guy I just met at a mastermind was in the middle of a strange challenge. He was handwriting five thank you cards a day every day for a full year. This challenge eventually led to a book “The Mr. Thank You Project,” Ted Talk, and professional speaking business. 

Not long afterwards, I started my own 365-day challenge, where I posted a motivational video every day for a year on Instagram. Those videos became the foundation of my sales coaching business, which ultimately became Untap Your Sales Potential, the world’s fastest growing sales coaching company. 

So it's fair to say this company exists in part because of John Israel.

This week I finally got to sit down with John on our monthly Fireside Chat and hear his entire story. Including why he owns 205 chickens on his homestead outside Dallas, Texas. 

Here's the part about John most people don't know.

John was the #6 seller out of 10,000 reps at Cutco, where he sold gifting services for client appreciation. And in his own words, he had become the most ungrateful gratitude salesman on planet Earth.

One evening he got home ready to complain to his wife about his day, and he stopped. She was nursing their newborn with one arm and handwriting a thank you card with the other. He couldn't appreciate this beautiful moment because he was too stressed and overwhelmed. 

He has a name for that which he calls “perpetual discontentment.” That never-ending feeling that you aren’t where you’re supposed to be in life. 

If you carry a quota, you probably know the feeling. Only allowing yourself to be happy when you’re performing, and typically that happiness is short-lived when you have to start all over again next year. 

That was the catalyst. John committed to five handwritten thank you cards a day for 365 days, and that one year turned into a book, a TED talk, and a career built on a single idea: gratitude is one of the biggest, underutilized advantages in sales.

We covered a lot in this one:

• What he actually does with his 205 chickens 
• The four black-and-white rules that made him finish 365 days straight, when most of us quit a challenge by day nine
• The $1,000-a-day bet that guaranteed he never missed a single day
• The "Story, Significance, Struggle" formula for building real connections fast (it lines up almost exactly with what we teach for executive conversations)
• How to make everybody in your life feel safe, seen, significant, and supported
• How he uses strategic gifting to turn expensive, hard-to-reach executives into lifelong customers 
• The quickest way to get yourself to prospect every single day

If you've been grinding hard and still can't enjoy the results, this episode is for you. 

Learn more at: http://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast